


Daring Sun

by Hakuryen



Series: In these Lands of Everlasting Change [3]
Category: Mozart l'Opéra Rock - Mozart/Baguian & Guirao
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fae, Duelling, Fae AU, Fae Magic, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Miscommunication, No actual horror elements, Politics, Summer Court King Mozart, Winter Court King Salieri, Written for Halloween '19
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-13 10:21:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21242531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hakuryen/pseuds/Hakuryen
Summary: "I neither came here to become king nor to find a partner, but if I had to choose between the two my choice is crystal clear."It's been a month since Wolfgang's coronation, two since he and Nannerl had first set foot into this strange realm, and they're slowly beginning to find their place amongst the fae. His and Antonio's relationship is blossoming, and he is learning much about the lands and his new people. But there is night at the end of each successful day, and discord has grown across the kingdom like a weed.





	Daring Sun

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AngelofNewYears](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AngelofNewYears/gifts), [Liravell](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Liravell/gifts).

> This is dedicated to Kai, as a surprise and a mixed luv/thanks, and to Marysia, whom I've annoyed with this for the past two months. Thanks for being there for me, you two.
> 
> Enjoy!

They were brothers. Alike in many facets, different in many more. The first one – radiant, fair in hair and eyes and skin sun-touched, playing a flute to the rhythm of the day, calling upon warm rays, content rivers, a plethora of boisterous sights to behold. The other, more subtle – his magic induced the earth through soft touches, sure caresses that left behind calm and beauty as pale and dark as his own being.

They loved another. Centuries went by in which they rolled through the lands, left companionable laughter behind and let the earth remember them by the magic that trailed their steps, until, one day, they crashed. An argument, nothing more, driven to the point they could no longer look each other in the eyes without their kindred hearts soaring at the things that had been said, and for the first time in eons their paths diverged. Their backs turned on each other, each one's family and friends trailing behind, seeking out own lands. Peace wasn't to be had, even in avoidance, and quarrels broke out which escalated into fights, which then turned to war.

No one stood above them, no one to show them their misguided ways, as they were the oldest of their kind next to only one. No one – except for their mother. Being ancient and solitary in that had made her weary, and she had lain down to become one with the earth once she saw her sons mature and strong. Their travelling magic touches had assured her even in her sleep, yet their warring woke her. The earth split before her form as she left her resting place, the rift that had been between these brothers now materialised, and with her the stars woke to banish the darkness within the hearts of her children. Cowering before their mother, but still unwilling to look over their dispute, the sons agreed to a tribunal, both thinking their own side would emerge righteously. A week went by, the days indistinguishable from the lack of night. The primordial mother showed both her children the wrongs of their ways, and, tired of their lack of insight, instigated I way for them to live together with neither bloodshed nor further tensions and struggles for territory. A system of cohabitation and -ruling, guided by solstices and subject to the tides of their lands. Knowing her sons and their power, she split each of their abilities and moulded them into new life, a partner court to each of them, with the task of keeping in line and aiding. Exhausted from the tribunal and the magic expended, the mother gave her children one last kiss and sank into eternal rest, becoming one with the forests, and the rivers, and the stones.

Peace ruled, a peace that had been lost to the minds of many a fae, and the courts were grateful for their mother's guidance. A gathering is held twice a year in memoriam, led by the solstices. Four figures stepped forwards. First two children, one holding a flower and the other a golden apple; next, two men – one offering a wreath of grain and golden bands, the other a skull covered in ice so beautiful it seemed bejewelled.

Wolfgang watched in awe as the multi-coloured light that broke through the mosaic windows magnified the scene, laying softly over the faint spectral outline of the primordial mother over her descendants, until the scene dispersed with the magical music that had summoned it. The last tones of the organ somewhere behind them faded into nothingness, no longer induced with magic intent, and a hush fell over the sacred building. The sanctuary was near-empty; a few other fae were sitting in the main hall below, not able to see Wolfgang and Antonio where they sat on the lowest balcony. Twilight had already set in, making the colourful imagery of the glass dome above them burn in lovely colours. Turning around, Wolfgang watched as the organ player in her temple-robes got up from the huge instrument, whose intricate pipes reached high into the building.

"That was beautiful," he whispered. "It's not a normal organ, but a magic instrument?"  
"It is," Antonio murmured back, careful of the echoing interior of the building. "As far as I know, this one is ancient. It's supposed to have been built not long after the truce and establishment of our kingdom as it is now."  
"Do you think I could play it?"  
"No." A soft shake of his head, and a nuzzled kiss to his temple. "It's sacred, and the honour of playing it is passed down the generations. I'm afraid I can't let you apply to become an apprentice, I need you next to me in kingship."  
He couldn't help but hum in disappointment. "Apprentice? Do you need to learn?"  
"Of course. It is a musical instrument after all, and magic is only efficient if you have full control over the magical instrument you use. It's easy to wag around a wand, but playing tunes takes more effort."  
"I can already play though."  
"I don't doubt that, Wolfgang. But this is not your place."  
At that, Wolfgang huffed and put up his hood - Antonio had procured cloaks for both of them to not be recognised during their evening trip through the city. He quickly wound his way through the pews and down the stairs, Antonio close behind him, and stepped out from the warm halls of the sanctuary into the cold streets. Momentarily, a small cloud from his breath meeting the frigid air clouded his vision.

A month had gone by since the autumn equinox reached them, since he had been named proper king of the summer court and handed the crown over to Antonio until spring arrives again. The weather was already turning colder and gloomier by the day, but for now they were still stuck in the autumnal whims of a late October. Just a few hours before a storm was still raging, having lasted for a little over three days, and Wolfgang and Antonio had decided to use the respite from the downpour to escape the palace walls for even a few short hours. Now, the wind was picking up again; Wolfgang shivered as it managed to cut through his cloak. Antonio must've obviously noted, for just a moment later he stepped in front of his partner to draw a rune of warmth onto his chest with his ring.

Immediately, Wolfgang felt his form being warmed up from the inside and smiled, the short disgruntlement from just before forgotten.  
"Aren't you cold yourself?"  
"Has it left your mind that I'm unseelie? It'd take the deepest of winters for me to feel truly cold."

"Why do you always crawl up to me in bed like a cat seeking warmth then?"  
"That's just me looking for your loving embrace."  
"Okay, you sap. Come on, your spell is lovely but the wind is still like a whip and I'd rather spend the night in front of a warm hearth with a good book than wrestling with the elements." At this, he grabbed for Antonio's hand, holding his hood up with the other, and as such they made their path towards their chambers. As they crossed the threshold of the palace, Antonio halted in his steps and let go of his lover's hand.

"You go ahead, I just remembered I've got one last thing to do."  
"I'll have the mulled wine ready," Wolfgang smiled and, at last, went onwards to welcome the comfort of his home.

~*~

The next day dawned, bringing with it a new torrent of rain, and with it Wolfgang greeted an empty bed and an equally empty schedule. Having spent every day of the last few weeks trailing Antonio in his kingly duties to learn them from more than just tomes and lectures, the other man had now told him to take a day off for once. Wolfgang was glad for it. While the time spent that way was interesting and he got to see more of his boyfriend during these days than before his coronation, it was only possible at the expense of spending less time with his sister. Sure, they did still eat most of their meals together and often met up for an hour or so after sun-down to talk and relax together, but it had nothing on the days they spent together in their old home. He had originally planned to explore the city with her for a bit, since he hadn't been able to leave the palace much since arriving in this strange realm, - a plan that had to be cancelled because of the weather.

Still, he wouldn't let that bring him down. It was still a full day spent with Nannerl, after all, instead of with courtly matters and tiring lessons that hadn't ceased after his and Hieronymous's trial. As such, Wolfgang quickly dressed himself with a gentle smile on his face, still wishing that Antonio had kissed him good-morning instead of sneaking out without a word, and made his way towards one of the drawing rooms where he knew his sister and he would meet up. The splatter of rain was beating in on the tall windows, and more fae than usual made their way through the inner grounds of the palace in an attempt to escape the rain for as long as possible, most of them greeting Wolfgang with a short bow of their head. He gladly smiled back at them.

The drawing room wasn't a big one, barely enough to hold a dozen people. Nannerl, Constanze, and Aloysia were already seated in some of the big armchairs that took up most of the space, a small buffet was laid out to the side.

"Good morning, ladies," he greeted them with a kiss to each of their cheeks. Having done that and feeling ravenous, he turned towards the buffet, letting himself fall down into one of the vacant chairs once he had his breakfast.

The girls hadn't stopped in their conversation on some magical matter, which Wolfgang was only now tuning into.

"... just as important as other moods of nature. The earth needs water to flourish and storms cleanse bad magic from the air," Constanze explained, supported by Aloysia's soft nodding, who was mostly keeping silent and sipping on her tea.

"Bad magic?" his sister asked and, seeing her brother in the chair next to her, intertwined their ankles.

"Bad magic: not just we fae are able to magick, but everything else in this world exudes magic energy too. It's all about balance – somewhere a baby is born which releases positive energy, and the next minute a being is murdered which negates from the atmosphere. The scales often tip over, both into the negative and positive, and too much of either is bad. Rain pushes the magic into the ground where it is absorbed and transformed, and wind pushes it wayward where it can't do much harm," Aloysia now chipped in.

"How can too much positive magic be bad?" he asked. He could see that his sister was furrowing her brows in confusion, too.

Constanze smiled at him. "It's not so much for adult fae, but our younglings are especially susceptible to their environment. Too much of either can upset the way they later on perceive their surroundings and how they deal with their own magic."

"Now that you mention it …," Nannerl mumbled next to him. "I've barely seen any children around. Maybe only one amongst a hundred adults. Is that normal?"  
This made Wolfgang stop short. He hadn't noticed the fact that he had not yet seen a single fae child even once. Maybe because of the way he had grown up – Nannerl had been the only other child he had ever played with, and their father kept them pretty isolated apart from their brief visits to various courts, which were obviously childless, to focus on their studies – his subconscious hadn't picked up on that, simply because it was _normal_ for him to only have adults around. Besides, he spent most of his days in the palace too nowadays, and no one brought their children there.

"Isn't that something that was explained in your culture lessons?" Constanze asked. "We fae live for centuries longer than humans, and time goes by differently than on your earth. Because of that, we perceive the passing of time differently too; and fae aren't very fertile on top of that. Fae children are rare, only a few every few decades."

At this, Aloysia snorted, mumbling beneath her breath: "No idea how mamá and papá managed with us. Must've been the spring court genes."

Satisfied with the answer, Wolfgang nodded and turned towards his food again. As he chewed and listened to the resuming conversation, he looked out of the window. It was still dark out, dawn still a ways off, so all that he could see was the reflection of himself and his surroundings, and the few raindrops that met it at the glass. What a fitting metaphor. He was a king of these lands, yet he knew nothing about them short of his lessons and palace observations. He hadn't even had the time to get to know the city, the palace being his only familiar grounds. He saw it from its heart, the skyline that was flooded in golden beams at dawn and twilight, far off from the red skies he was used from his own homeworld, but it was still strange to him, as were his people. Today would've given Wolfgang the possibility to actually see a bit more of what exactly he was supposed to rule in the future.

"Say, girls," he interrupted their talking. "Is there a way for us to still do some exploration despite the weather?"

Nannerl, who knew that he had barely left the palace, smiled at him placatingly and laid a hand on his arm. "Can't we teleport using magic?" she asked the two sisters, and Wolfgang could've groaned. Of course! That's how they had entered this realm in the first place, and how Antonio had taken him on their first ever date. 

"It's difficult magic, and not really Aloysia's or my strong point," Constanze began, causing Wolfgang's heart to already sink. "But I think the palace has portals to other cities. I can ask around for it, we've never used them before."  
At this, Wolfgang's mood abruptly lifted again and he smiled at them in gratitude. "That would be amazing."

~*~

The autumn had put its grip around the heart, the capital, of their lands, and as such spread out towards all its extremities too, namely the different provinces of the kingdom.

It wasn't raining here, though.

Constanze and Aloysia had quickly located a person who could open a portal for them and later on bring them back again; they were now in a quaint town a multiple days travel by horse away from the capital. The sisters explained that this is where their father lived before moving into the capital where he met and married Cäcilia. They had only visited the place a handful of times before to meet their grandparents, who had passed away only a few months after the girls had reached maturity.

"Fae, in most cases, only have one partner in life. And they spend so many years with them, that, by the end of their lifespan their magic and life-force are intertwined, and if one of them dies the other's mind and body aren't strong enough to keep going without their second half," Constanze explained when Nannel asked how it could be that both of them passed away at once. "It is quite romantic, but even more tragic when disaster strikes."

The town's people regarded them friendly, most of them recognising Aloysia and Constanze even though they hadn't visited in decades, and Wolfgang enjoyed the casual interactions he had with them since these people did not yet recognise him as their new king. The population seemed to mostly be spring fae and some of the summer court, although he could see a few figures walking around that seemed to be unseelie.

Their luck seemed to persist; no further rain threatened to fall and the clouds even allowed a bit of sun to touch the earth during the few hours that they spent wandering through the town, exploring little shops and interesting sights. Wolfgang and Nannerl got to try a few dishes and sweets that they hadn't yet seen in the capital or palace, and see some flora and fauna that was rarer in the bigger city. Sadly, the hours went by faster than they would've liked, and with the approaching dusk, their excursion was nearing its end. They located the person who would take them back to the palace again, and thanked them profusely after stepped through. There, a storm was still raging.

The constantly bad weather was putting a dampener on Wolfgang's mood, giving him half a mind to try and change it by pure force of will alone – or, much likelier, pure force of magic.

Still mulling over the possibilities of any way to influence the weather but soon discarding them because of what Constanze had told them about bad magic earlier, he made his way towards his and Antonio's chambers. The other man hadn't yet returned from his daily duties, so Wolfgang carried out his nightly routine in solitude and curled up in bed with a book he had been meaning to read for a while now. He quickly got lost in it, and therefor didn't notice Antonio coming in until he was pressing soft kisses to his temple and check.

"Hey there," Wolfgang smiled and turned up his face like a sunflower in a silent request for a real kiss. Antonio, of course, granted his wish, placing three more pecks on his lips before turning away to get ready for bed himself.

"Did you have fun?"

"Quite." He closed his book after marking the page. "The weather was too bad, so Nannerl and Aloysia got somebody to open a portal for us and we visited another town. It was nice! I wish it hadn't been over so quickly."  
"What did you do?"  
"We just walked around, explored the place. Had some food, looked at nature and fae-made structures. It was good to be amongst people who aren't working in the palace."

Antonio was quick to finish, and crawled into bed himself to pull Wolfgang into a loose embrace.  
"That's right … you haven't yet seen much of our realm." At this, he bit on his lower lip and his gaze drifted away from Wolfgang's eyes – something was clearly on his mind, troubling him. " … maybe it really would be better if you got away from the palace for a bit."

"Is everything alright?"

"Of course," Antonio was quick to answer. "It seems good for you to travel our lands for a bit, to see what exactly you'll be ruling. Besides, the populace has been asking to see their new king, so I shall arrange for a travelling party for you. It'll pain me to be away from you for more than a day, but this might be the best time to go on such a trip."  
"Ah, dear Antonio," Wolfgang murmured and pressed another kiss to his lips. "My heart burns for you and without you at my side, my days will be so much colder. But I also need air to keep this flame alive, and at the moment the palace walls are suffocating me. All I do is follow you around, and learn, and study, and review. I hadn't the time to let my mind or body wander, and not a single note has been brought into life through my hands since coming here. It may pain us both, but I think it'd really be best to let me go. If only for a few weeks. Besides, I'm always a portal away should something be the matter."  
"You're right," Antonio sighed. "Let me teach you how to open portals yourself before you go. It's not a safe practice if you aren't familiar with the place you're aiming for, so I haven't dared showing you so far. But like this you'll at least be able to come back to the palace, or the places you've already been to, on your own so I won't be worried about you getting lost without a way to find back."  
"Thank you," Wolfgang said with another kiss of gratitude. "I just remembered … Nannerl mentioned today that a lot of fae only ever have one partner? What about you?"

It was difficult to see, but Antonio must've been blushing at that. "... I haven't really had any interest in that before meeting you. And yet I know I'd never want another."  
"Antonio! We've barely known each other for a month when you made advances, and only a full moon has passed since then!"

"And those two months were enough time to compare you to everyone I've encountered in my centuries of wandering these plains, and to know that you're unlike anyone I've ever met and the person I want to be with until my dying day."

"You old sap," Wolfgang complained, but he couldn't help grinning. And, after not being able to hold it in anymore, leant over Antonio with a giddy glee to pepper him in kisses and touches.

~*~

A few hours of the next day were spent planning for his travels. Wolfgang of course asked for his sister to join him, and Constanze and Aloysia if they so wished. Their departure was set to three days away, to allow for enough time to plan and gather everything and everyone needed.

Antonio transferred the preparations to him, as his first independent task, but not without providing assistants who could help him. As such they spent most of these days parted. In the evenings, Antonio taught him the operating of portals, whose magic leant more towards the preciseness and frigidness of unseelie than the intuitional, emotional one of the seelie.

"You should get another magical instrument soon," Antonio advised then. "Your conducting stick is good for magic that tells a story, as are all musical magical instruments, but it'll only give you headaches to summon portals and other magic in a way that feels natural. For now, I'll lend you this-" he said and pulled a ring off his own hand to stick it on Wolfgang's left hand.

"Antonio – thank you, but don't you need that yourself?"  
"I told you, I accumulated quite the assortment of instruments over the years; I'll fare without my ring for a few weeks. And if it keeps you safe, I'd give you all of them."  
"Please don't, I don't want you to be in danger because you've no way of defending yourself," Wolfgang said, blushing intensely.

"I think you're forgetting something." At this, Antonio lifted one hand and let his shadow magic twirl around it, which required no instrument at all.

"... Point taken."

After that, they got down to teaching Wolfgang the basics. At first, Antonio showed him the motions and the intent behind it, and once he had that down he was asked to try and teleport from one corner of the room to the other. Like that they could see both the entry and the exit of the portal forming and didn't have to fear Wolfgang ending up in no-man's-land. His first try did indeed go awry, although they didn't know where the portal would've led to, but the second one was already successful. They had him try another handful of times to make sure it wasn't just a lucky try before bedding down. The creation of portals was taxing magic, even more strenuous the further you travelled. Even more advanced was the travelling into other realms, as Antonio explained. This, Wolfgang knew a bit of. After all it had been explained to him that his father chose to open a portal at a certain time that enhanced magic, namely twilight, and in a place that overlapped with the realm of the fae. Without those two factors, he might've not been strong enough to come back here, especially since his magic had been dampened in the human world.  
Of course, the more you teleported the better you became at it and the less it took out of you. There was so much he still had to learn.

~*~

It was the day of their departure, and Wolfgang was torn between feeling excited and queasy. On the one hand, he was looking forward to finally being free to see these lands for himself, on the other, worry began creeping up on him. What if something _did_ happen to him and his sister? What if something happened to Antonio while he was gone? He's never had to leave someone he loved behind for so long.  
"It'll be fine," Antonio reassured him as he led Wolfgang towards the horses. "You've got some guards with you, and some fae that know the realm like the back of their hand. No one will hurt you and you won't wander into dangerous parts. Here, sit up – I'm lending you my own horse for the time. She is strong and gentle, she will serve you well."

"How are you so sure?" Wolfgang mumbled as he accepted Antonio's hand in help of saddling up.  
"By knowing that no one will attack you because of the fear of me. They know that whoever hurts you will answer to me."  
Steady on the horse but smile uneasy, Wolfgang looked down at his lover and, after a second, leant forward one last time to give him a goodbye kiss. The girls who were glad to join him and all the other people that'd accompany them said their farewells too, and with that they made their way out of the city and into the wide meadows.

~*~

The kingdom was beautiful. Lady Fortune was looking down on them, bequeathing them with good weather and easy travel, and wherever they arrived, fae rushed in to greet their new king. He took care to speak to them personally in the afternoons, and in the mornings, when the dewdrops still hung heavy and the sun was still young, he sought out the children to play with them and exchange small demonstrations of magic. Not seldom did the people gift him with little presents – lovingly made carvings, home-baked goods, crowns wrought from autumn-flowers foreign in their forms and colours. The girls, too, got their fair share; Nannerl and Constanze took joy in helping out and spending time with the younglings of the lands, and even if Aloysia tried to be inconspicuous he caught her singing magic to the plants more than once.

Although the end of the year was nigh nature held a lot of charm. Wolfgang had always been more of a summer child, but in this strange season he found beauty. Dawn and Twilight still hung golden in the sky, the first and last rays of the sun breaking on the earth like sea-foam, and the blue-tinted grass swayed to and fro under the caressing winds that smelled faintly like loam. Still unfamiliar plants and animals lay in wait around every river bend, and the stars shone down on them speaking of different figures and stories than those he was used to. He'd have to ask Antonio about them one day, maybe he'd be able to tell him about them. He was looking forward to seeing him again. But for now he'd let his soul soar free and high, and cherish the memories he'd gather over the weeks to hold them ever the dearer once he was back in the capital.

~*~

December had already rolled over the lands when they arrived back at the capital. Despite only a few hours having gone by since noon, dusk had already cast its shadows over the earth and as such they rode into town under cover of darkness. No one at the palace seemed to anticipate them.

They left their horses to the stable boys, and thanked and said good-bye to their travelling companions, and then Wolfgang, Nannerl and the Weber sisters were off to a shared dinner. Wolfgang knew that Antonio wouldn't yet finish up with his daily tasks for another few hours, and so he took his sweet time dining and chatting with the girls, talking excitedly about everything they had seen and with Nannerl and him directing any questions and enquiries towards the older fae. Once nightfall had passed by at least an hour he pressed a quick kiss to each of their cheeks and, with a spring in his step, made his way back towards his and Antonio's chambers.

The other man was already there.

Dressed in his night robes, Antonio was sitting in one of the armchairs angled towards the door, reading a book. As soon as Wolfgang stepped through first his eyes and then he himself went up, and they met each other in the middle, their point of collision a deep kiss.

"Hello there," Wolfgang murmured once they had parted, his arms having sneaked around Antonio's waist sometime along.

"Good evening, Wolfgang." A soft mumble back, and a hand gliding through his hair gently. "I was told you had arrived; did you have a pleasant journey?"

"Very much so. There's probably naught a corner untouched by us, and I must've laid eyes on every seelie and unseelie in the country. They were so happy to see me, even a lot of winter and autumn fae! They're all so lovely, I wish I could always wander like this. Now I see why you always left the capital when you weren't in reign."  
"I didn't spend that time travelling though. But no more on that – come over here, dear, I had something made while you were gone. I gave it in commission the day at the sanctuary. I hope you like it."  
At this, Wolfgang was led towards a corner of the room, from which Antonio lifted an illusion spell just a second later. What was revealed was …

A grand piano.

It had a dark ebony colouration, and the runework on its legs and corpus was still visible in a faint teal glow. Antonio must've chosen for them to lay open instead of Lorenzo covering them up as usual.

"Amongst the usual inscriptions is an inlaid spell that allows for you to shrink the piano, so that you can transport it without difficulties; you can channel your magic through it for any means you find fitting. I hope you like it."  
"_Like _it? Antonio, I love it! Thank you so much!"

Another deep kiss was shared amongst them, not lasting as long as it could have since Wolfgang was too eager to try out his new magical instrument. Over three months had gone by since he last had keys under his fingers, yet his own composed melodies came to him easily. He let himself be swept away by them, infused the notes with his magic without putting any intent behind it, thus allowing for it to run haywire and do whatever the music wished it do. Antonio would stop him if his magicking took a dangerous turn, after all. He went through three piano pieces like that before he returned to the present and turned around towards the other fae. As he did so his eyes glid through the room, which was gleaming in a thin diaphanous layer of gold and reeking faintly of ozone, before landing on Antonio. He wasn't looking at Wolfgang. Much rather, his eyes were cast forward focused onto nothing as if in deep thought, while he chewed softly on his bottom lip.

Wolfgang had to repeat his name three times before he jolted out of his reverie.  
"- yes, of course, your playing is lovely, even divine, dear."  
"You weren't even listening," Wolfgang accused. "Is everything alright?"  
"Yes, of course. I apologise, today has just been a long day, and I must've drifted off from exhaustion. Please, do play again for me tomorrow morning? I'll be in a much better state of mind then."  
For a second Wolfgang hesitated, but then he smiled in reconciliation. "Gladly."  
He was still disappointed.

~*~

As promised, he played for Antonio again the next morning. He only got through two of the three pieces, since Antonio was pressed for time, but this time his reaction was genuine. Wolfgang had to laugh as, after the first piece ended, he turned around to see Antonio dumb- and love-struck; his mouth slightly agape and eyes closed in pleasure.  
"Truly divine," he whispered reverently. "I've never heard something so lovely and heart-warming. Please, I beg you, keep playing."

He gladly did so and would've kept going for hours on end, but after just the first bar of the third piece came to an end a knock on the door interrupted them. Outside was a servant to the palace, reminding Antonio that he was to meet with the head of a town council in a little over half an hour, and the unseelie king thanked him before closing the door. Wolfgang had already stood up to follow him, but was stopped by Antonio laying a hand to his chest.  
"Take today as a rest-day from your travels. We can resume your studies and observing tomorrow, but for now take care to arrive properly and make sure you're settled again." A feather-light peck to his lips. "Maybe Aloysia will do a duet with you? I'll see you tonight."

With that he was off and Wolfgang left alone. His chest heaving under a heavy sigh, he turned back towards the piano to figure out the shrinking mechanism and made his way towards the drawing room he always had breakfast in. Nannerl and Constanze were already were and so he greeted them with hugs and bisous. They had breakfast together and, once Aloysia joined them, Wolfgang proudly showed off his new piano that was still kept in miniature form.  
"Wolfie!" Nannerl exclaimed, "Come on, reverse the size, we haven't played in ages!"  
They had to shift around the armchairs a bit for the grand to fit, but once they had it settled both Wolfgang and his sister sat down in front of it and decided on a duet. They didn't yet imbue it with magic, only playing for playing's sake, but were still met with thunderous applause from Constanze and Aloysia.  
"Aloysia," he spoke up as Nannerl stood up to have a closer look at the instrument itself. "Care to join me?"  
"Oh, I don't play."  
"But you sing!"

"It'd be a mess though, if we both were to just play and sing without coordination."

"Oh, that probably won't be a problem," Nannerl piped up. "Wolfie remembers dozens of arrangements, I'm sure he can jot something down for you really quick. You're okay with sight-reading?"  
"I am, though I might not sound as good as I would with having practiced first." Her eyes followed Wolfgang as he magicked up a sheet of paper and, with a steady beat of his conducting stick, made notes and words appear on it. He only made one copy, handing it over to Aloysia, before sitting down at the piano again and looking up at her.

It was a simple enough piece, without seeming insultingly simplistic, with a lot of opportunities for her to show off her voice. She smiled, and nodded towards him.

Wolfgang counted down for both of them, and then began to play. His part was less showing off, more accompanying Aloysia to put her in the limelight; a decision that truly paid off in the light of her skill and allure. She sang like a nightingale.

Every now and then, there were bumps in their unpractised harmonising, but Wolfgang tried best as he could to smooth them out by sending magical signals to her through his music, little instructions and tips on what was to come. About halfway through their performance, he could feel that Aloysia was using magic too. It was no physical display, so he didn't quite know what her intentions behind it were, but he _did_ suddenly feel very light and happy.  
Their little performance came to an end, and he was almost sad to let it go, but ever the more glad for having experienced it.  
"Thank you," he said towards Aloysia, stood up, and bowed to her. "Your singing puts all the operas to shame, and I'm grateful for having had the honour to play alongside you."  
She blushed in response, even more so when he took her hand in his to breathe a kiss on it. When he looked back towards Nannerl and Constanze, Nannerl was looking at Aloysia in delight.  
"Your singing is so good!" she gushed. "Why don't you two do another piece? Let's open the windows – I'm sure the court will rejoice in it."  
Neither Aloysia nor he minded, so they did indeed do another piece. And another, and another – until evening approached and they had to stop for dinner and rest.

The happenings of the day made his steps light, a spring in them, and he hummed as he approached his and Antonio's chambers. He just wanted to cuddle him right now -

But Antonio was already there, and he gave Wolfgang a weird look as he entered, as if he wasn't quite sure how to react to his presence.

And Wolfgang just imploded, so out of nowhere: "I don't get it – Antonio, you've been behaving so weirdly lately and I just don't know why. I wish you'd tell me."  
"It's nothing."  
"It's obviously _something_! You've been giving me these weird looks, talking behind my back when you thought I wouldn't see, silencing conversations when I entered the rooms. Do you not want me at your side anymore?" His bottom lip quivered, but he got through without any hiccups.

"Of course not! It's just ..." Antonio couldn't even look him in the eyes.

"It's just _what_?"  
"People have been complaining. People who work in the palace mostly, but their complaints have sowed discord amongst the common people too. They're bringing up the issue of your coronation – saying that it's been a conspiracy; since we're a couple they think you're partial to me and that the power balance inside the palace is now fully on the side of the unseelie. They say I've helped you win to gain more power, that you're no better choice than Hieronymous despite the trial. They demand a rematch, with a proper duel to prove that you can fight to protect the kingdom." Once Antonio had started his confession he couldn't stop, words falling out of his mouth in a cascade of relief. "I've been trying to resolve the issue and quiet the complaints without you being bothered or disheartened by them. You shouldn't have to deal with that when you haven't even reigned yourself yet."  
"Is that why you so readily agreed to my travelling? To get me out of the palace so that you could decide over issues that affect me as well alone?"

"Please don't worry too much about it -"  
"I do, though. I'd be fine if it was just concerning me, people have always run their mouth over me. I'm too loud, too rowdy, too queer. But this is also affecting you – I don't want your people's opinion on you to change because of me. Our relationship probably hasn't been known to too many people before, but now with them running off their mouth because of rumours it'll spread like wildfire. Do you think the unseelie will take well to their king fraternising with a summer fae? And, besides, - your position as king has been questioned before, what with your shadow magic and coming from nowhere. You told me that. And now you're telling me that you want to put that into jeopardy even more by not giving me to chance to make a decision for myself, by trying to cover it up? I don't want your kingship to be endangered because of me. I neither came here to become king nor to find a partner, but if I had to choose between the two my choice is crystal clear."

For a second, both of them stood still, not knowing what to say. A thick tension lay between them, disturbed only by the ripples of their desperate breathing.

"Wolfgang, no -" Antonio eventually squeezed out. "That'd be giving in. Stepping down from the throne would only prove them right, _which they aren't_. I didn't help you to become my puppet or pawn. Hell, I didn't even really help you; but that doesn't matter. Please, let us talk about this to find the best solution."  
"Oh, so _now_ you want to talk? Make up your mind, Antonio."  
"I'm _sorry,_ okay? Please, just … let's not argue." He looked downtrodden, eyelids drooping low under the weight of exhaustion. Wolfgang gulped at the sight.  
"I'm sorry too. It's just … Everyone has always made decisions over my life without consulting me, and I'm tired of it. I know I'm nowhere near as old or experienced as you are, but in matters regarding me I still want to have a say. I'm just as concerned as you are, for the both of us, even though I don't yet know all the details; but I'm willing to fight, if you wish for me to do that."  
They looked each other in the eyes for a moment, before, in a sign of reconciliation, taking each other's hand. The rest of the evening was spent discussing how best to proceed. They both knew Wolfgang was incredibly talented, but this aptitude hadn't yet been tested out in combative forms of magic.

"You'll need another magical instrument more suited for fighting, a sword for example. Also, the fact that Hieronymous has a few hundred years of experience on you is problematic. Sure, you won the first trial, but that was mainly due to creativity and talent. Experience bests talent in combat, at least in most cases."

"I'll train day and night, then. His old age may come at an advantage for me."  
"Don't underestimate him because of that; age affects fae different than humans."

They fell back in silence again then, both of them left to their own thoughts, before Wolfgang piped up again.

"Say, Antonio," he began. "How come everyone keeps saying that Nannerl and I are so talented? We are doing no magic different from anyone else's."  
"It's because of how fast you learn. Both of your connection to your magic should've been akin to that of a fae toddler to theirs when you arrived here. But the control you displayed even on your first tries!"  
"How do you even know about that, you weren't yet back at the palace when we had our first lesson?"  
"And both of your magic feels so pure, so natural," Antonio ignored him. "It must be because of how you grew up."

"Can you please answ- wait, what do you mean, 'how we grew up'?"  
"You grew up in the human realm where next to no magic lies. Here, fae are surrounded by it their whole lives which affects their own magic; it influences how strong they are and in which areas that strength materialises. Since you didn't have those influences and your magic didn't interact with the world outside of your body, it was able to develop to its fullest potential without being moulded."  
"Ah, I think I remember Aloysia and Constanze telling us about it – good and bad magic in the atmosphere, right?"  
"Right, but not just that. You're also affected by the fae around you, hence all spring fae having an affinity for healing and nature, summer with elements, and the such. These inclinations become more blurred in bigger cities where all courts reside, but they're still distinct enough. It's also how I came to acquire shadow magic."

"What do you mean?"  
"I haven't yet told you of this – but I grew up very close to the shadow realm, in the grounds of the Night Forest, when I was a child. My direct family set up home there, in hopes of escaping their ties to the royalty of this kingdom, and I was the only young child. The fae of the shadow court are banished into their lands, but magic isn't bound by borders, and as such I lived alongside it for decades until it became a part of me. My parents didn't know it would happen, there's never been a precedent for that. But … yes, that's the reason I have shadow magic."  
And this ... this was entirely new to Wolfgang. And it'd probably be to the rest of their people too. Who else knew of this story? He could distantly remember the rumours he had been told about Antonio before he truly got to know him – how he had supposedly foolishly wandered into the arms of the shadow fae, how they had eaten his heart and replaced it with tendrils of their magic to warn off others. What humbug.

What else had he been told that was woven out of pure lies, even if the teller wasn't aware of that? Who could or already had intentionally taken advantage of his ignorance of this realm, had maybe even manipulated him? Who could he really trust?  
He _would_ need to get stronger, and wiser. He would.

~*~

The next day, they announced that he challenged Hieronymous for a final duel to determine who truly deserved the crown. The date was set to the changing of the years, and thus the preparations began. Training combative magic was hard, but he wouldn't cease in his efforts.

This flame of his wouldn't snuff.

~*~

Firstly, they had to commission another magical instrument more suited for battle for him. They decided on a quarterstaff, which also wouldn't take Stephanie and Lorenzo as long to make as a grand piano. After the course of a day, it already got handed over to Wolfgang, who immediately went to a practice hall to familiarise himself with it. He had never held a weapon before, safe for kitchen knives or pretend-weapons in his childhood, so getting used to something actually dangerous had his mind in disarray, even if the staff was blunt. Although he knew that neither he nor Hieronymous would die in this battle, potentially hurting another being still sat wrong with him.

As such, it took him three whole days just to get used to holding this weapon in his hands and using it in a way that felt fluent. After that, he practised – spells that were destructive in nature, magicking up barriers to defend himself with, tactics that would help him win. He was good at it, but none of it made him feel confident.

~*~

"There _must _be a way to end this duel without hurting him," he complained to his sister and Constanze one evening. "I need some trick up my sleeve, because I don't think I can best him through pure prowess alone."  
"You could make him just fall unconscious," Nannerl suggested offhandedly, half sunken into the book in her lap. "Are you sure you don't want to bring your conducting stick? You could produce a lullaby and make him fall asleep."  
"A nice idea, if there wasn't the possibility that Hieronymous would simple deafen his hearing to it," Constanze objected. "It'd need to be something he can't escape from. Actually … you should ask Antonio if maybe that's something shadow magic could come in handy for."

"What makes you think it would?"  
"Well, its biggest use is to take away - I mean, I've only heard of it being used to take others' magic – so maybe it'd be able to take someone's consciousness, too? Not permanently, of course," she hurried to add.

"I guess you're right, I should ask him … But wouldn't me using shadow magic not prove their point? That I'm just Antonio's little pet?"

"Well, normal fae are able to use a small amount of shadow magic too, if they set their mind to it, most just choose to rather keep their hands off it. You've got a point though, if they see that what you do stems from the shadows .. it'll be one hell of a backlash."  
And with that, the idea was discarded. Nevertheless, it wouldn't leave his mind, so when he and Antonio met up again later he brought it and his doubts up again.  
"It's a nice concept," his partner nodded, "but you're right in your worries. They'd have to look close to detect the type of magic, of course, but I'm afraid that in this instance everyone will have their eyes glued to your every move. We shouldn't discard the whole idea, though, just the means of bringing it about."  
With that, Wolfgang thought on it for the coming hours, but it wasn't until he lay sleepless at night that a flash of inspiration struck him.

~*~

The weeks had rolled by like thunder, and with one final clap, the day of the year-change had come. During that time, various fae of the palace had used their magic to build a stadium a bit away from the capital, big enough to hold every one of its inhabitants.

It still wasn't big enough.

His heart dropped in his chest as he heard that the workers had to make last-minute additions to the ranks where spectators could sit since so many more people than they had anticipated had come from all corners of the kingdom to spectate his and Hieronymous's duel.

"It seems that some of the visitors have offered their help in magicking up additional seating," the messenger reported. "They're pulling up the arena to an additional 300 feet in height. It is quite the task seeing as the duel is set to begin in just three hours, but they're optimistic with regard to the amount of people helping them do it."  
"Thank you, Colin," Antonio addressed him from where he was sitting at his secretary desk inside their chambers. "Is everything else prepared? Will we have at least one healer present?"  
"Süßmayr will see to the safety of everyone involved, sir, with the help of two more healers. We've also upped the number of fae to uphold a barrier around the fighting grounds from ten to thirty."  
"Thank you. That'll be all."  
Colin made one last bow before Wolfgang and Antonio before leaving the room, softly closing the door behind him.

Wolfgang's leg was bouncing wildly from where he was sitting next to his combat garments on the bed. A few minutes went by with nothing to hear but his shuffling and the quiet ticking of a clock, before; "Stop it."

Antonio's admonishment made him stop indeed, but it only lasted for a moment before both his legs picked up again. This time, only a heavy sigh left Antonio in his annoyance. He looked down at the paper he had been reading just before, before eventually standing up and walking over to where Wolfgang was sitting. The wriggling of his legs was promptly stopped by Antonio leaning forward and propping himself up on them. Now on eye level, they stared at one another.  
"Are you scared?" Antonio asked, much softer than anticipated. Wolfgang swallowed.

"No."  
"Nervous, then?"  
"... Maybe."  
"It'll be alright," he murmured, his eyes a deep pool of warmly dancing brown. "It is not a fight for life and death, only for the throne. Even Hieronymous wouldn't go as far as fatally wounding you, and if he did I'm afraid I'll have to rekindle a millennia old war."

It wasn't very reassuring. Even if he didn't die-

"And even if you lose, dear," Antonio continued, cutting through his doubts with the strength a very determined beam of sunlight through the thickest canopies. "You won't lose anything but the crown. You'll still be able to live in this realm, you'll still have Nannerl with you, and Constanze, and all your friends, and _me_. I'll love you no less, no one else will either."  
Yes. He had never asked for the crown in the first place, so – why was he so nervous, indeed? Nothing bad could happen to him, except maybe some humiliation, but it wouldn't be the first time. As long as he could hold Antonio's hand at the end of the day, and have Nannerl at his other side, he'd be fine.  
Finally, a sunny smile broke through his gloomy expression, Antonio responding to it in relief. After a second or so of dopily grinning at each other, they leant forward in unison.

Kissing Antonio still felt like it did the very first time, in that beautiful night-cast clearing in the forest, dancing lights above and around them. His chest still felt curiously light, and he couldn't help but sigh against Antonio's incredibly soft lips. One of his hands left Wolfgang's legs to instead cradle his cheek, and gladly Wolfgang leant into it to deepen the kiss at the same time.

Being with Antonio like this always made him forgot whatever was going on around him, and as such he couldn't help but whine in disappointment when Antonio let go of him after having taken Wolfgang thoroughly apart.

"We have all of the time in the world later, but for now you should reserve your energy for the duel and get ready for it."

"Why, Antonio, were you intending to wear me out?" he grinned mischievously. Antonio's cheeks were so adorably red as he gestured towards his garments. He excused himself as Wolfgang began to get dressed, wanting to make sure that everything was ready himself in beforehand.

What he was wearing for the duel was simple and practical, yet still elegant. Slim trousers led into form-fitting boots that were easy to move in and would give him enough stability even if the grounds of the battle turned uneven for some reason. His cornflower blue tunic loosely reached a few inches over his hips – something Antonio had advised him against, as the extra fabric could easily get caught in the rapidfire magic that might await him, and he shouldn't have to lose because his top caught fire.

But he needed it, to conceal what was beneath: a thin belt, from which hung his conducting stick, and his secret weapon. They weren't restricted in the amount of magical instruments they were allowed to bring, yet he thought it better not to put all his cards on the table from the get-go.

Once finished with dressing, with his staff in hand, he stepped outside where Corin was waiting to escort him to the arena.

"Are you ready, sir?" the young autumn fae enquired. Wolfgang smiled in response, and nodded.  
  


~*~

The stadium began to loom up on them as they approached on horseback, and Wolfgang could already hear the noise made by the audience from over a mile away. He cursed softly under his breath, but with eyes wide open in awe at the sight – never before had he seen such a big construction that wasn't a palace, or a masterwork cathedral. And all that just for _one_ duel.

It was wondrous what magic enabled fae to do.

They approached the eastern entryway, a small door made not to admit the crowd, but to let him enter unseen. Behind the threshold, Antonio, Nannerl and Constanze were already waiting for him, bracketed by some guards. The small group was back-lit from the gate that would lead them into the battleground, and the crisp winter light from outside to them.

"Wolfie," Nannerl breathed and hurried to him to softly take her brother's face into her hands and kiss his cheeks good luck. "Promise me not to do anything foolish."  
"Have you ever known me to do any such thing?" He grinned back at her, and was met with an exasperated furrow in her brow, before she made way for Constanze to also wish him the best of luck. He accepted her kisses to his cheeks too, and the short squeeze she gave his hands, before he saw the two women walk off to the ranks by using a staircase to their right, hand in hand.

"Wolfgang," Antonio murmured as he now came to his side. "There is no more left to say that hasn't already been said, except for that I believe in you, and I love you. Here – take this, too, maybe you'll find use in it for something."  
Wolfgang watched as Antonio slipped one of his rings off his finger, the same one he had given him weeks prior to keep him safe on his travels, and slipped it onto his left pointer finger.

"Wrong finger," he joked in hopes of lifting the mood a bit.  
"Shush," came the reprimand, and with that Antonio leant forwards to press his lips to the ring.

It barely lasted a second, and before Antonio could step away from him, Wolfgang pulled him into a proper kiss. No more words were said after that, as they smiled at each other before Antonio departed for the audience ranks. Outside, somebody magnified their voice to announce that the duel would begin in five minutes' time, and with that, Wolfgang began to prepare himself.

No snow had fallen thus far, the frigid winter instead leaving the ground covered by a layer of frost and the air heavy with cold. Hieronymous had entered the circular arena from the south-gate, about a hundred metres away from where Wolfgang had entered. His weapon was a kind of monk staff – a much more pompous and pretentious version of Wolfgang's simple quarterstaff, top and upper ringed end covered in a thick layer of gold, with runes all over.

This only showed his experience; using other courts' magic was easier by implementing a crutch of glyphs, runes, sigils, however one preferred to call them. Wolfgang so far had relied entirely on instinctual and natural magic brought up by his own power and imagination without any guidelines to lead it through. In hindsight, that should've probably been something he should've asked Antonio to teach him.

But that mistake lay in the past – right now he had to concentrate on the present, on the bows Hieronymous and he were both giving each other, and the starting call of the referee.  
The starting call had barely rung out when a monstrous ball of fire came hurling towards him, only just missing him as he dived to the side and crashed to the floor. The wall in front of which he had just stood was scorched black.

Disbelief coursed through him as he looked back towards Hieronymous in shock, only to see that he was already forming a second smaller, faster, fireball. Reflex saved him as he punched the earth with his ring to make it rise beneath him, carrying him high up, up, into the sky, far away from the fire that now hit the base of his pillar. He took the short reprieve to get back on his legs, albeit stumblingly in the face of the height he was at. Both Hieronymous and he seemed to consider how to best proceed from here; Wolfgang made up his mind faster, now hitting his staff to his pillar to give it the command to race back towards the earth. Just as it hit back to ground level he sent another impulse into the ground, and it came alive beneath him.

They still stood on earth, yet it behaved as a sea. A very stormy sea, indeed. Great waves billowed in towards Hieronymous, briefly hiding them from each other's eyes, and Wolfgang took this opportunity to make the ice crystals that sprung up from the broken frost form into a spear; and this he let follow in the waves' wake.

Hieronymous parted them like the Red Sea, and Wolfgang took satisfaction in seeing his eyes widen at the sight of the deadly spear just beyond, only for his heart to immediately sink at the possibility of killing him. It had been a split-second decision – he never intended to ..!  
  


It broke on Hieronymous's barrier.

A strange mixture of relief and disappointment now filled him, both of which he cursed himself for. But no time for that. He had to follow the plan he had made earlier, so he now magicked up a plethora of elemental beings – semi-transparent imagings, figures, lions made of blue fire, sharks of bubbling water, dragons of light, an otherworldly zoo. Anything he could think of in that second magnified tenfold. A grand display of power.

His menagerie charged towards his enemy, and just briefly he couldn't help but compare himself himself to a clown. Dressed up, behaving like a fool out of his depths, there to entertain the people who'd only think him dumb in the end anyway, no matter what he did.

His thoughts were blown away by the stormy gust of wind with which Hieronymous dissolved his elementals. Wolfgang gladly let the force of it feed into his exhaustion. Summoning them had cost him a great deal of energy – something that he had intended. He was banking on Hieronymous underestimating him, and making him think he was too tired to fight well was part of his plan.

Some strange part in him also revelled in just letting loose on his magic and power, working himself to the bone in a way he hadn't truly done since coming here.

Hieronymous obviously picked up on the downward slope of his shoulders, the drooping of his eyes. But he must've also picked up on the fact that this could be a ruse, for he did nothing and instead waited for Wolfgang's move.

A deep sigh heaved throughout Wolfgang when he realised that, and resigning himself to more exertion he commanded the ground beneath him to carry him towards Hieronymous, quarterstaff lifted in a stance that made it obvious he was about to enter close combat. The other man's magic might be more expansive and powerful than his, but his body was old and unfit, and he'd see that as a weakness and hopefully try to avert Wolfgang from exploiting it. Wolfgang was happy to see that that was indeed the case – another fireball began to form around the crown of the monk staff, Wolfgang now able to see that some of the runes on it must've been strengthening ones, since they glowed as it was created. In the face of that he stopped his approach and instead readied himself for the attack. And yet, despite seeing it form and come, he was just a millisecond too late in lifting his staff and twirling it around to create a whirlpool in front of him, not as far away as it could have been. Fire and water collided, and from them searing hot steam evaporated. A lot of it and some drops of boiling water hit him all over, and he could feel how his skin began to burn.

But he couldn't give up.

Clenching his teeth in pain, he left his staff in his right hand to hold up the stream of water and, with the ring on the other one, began to duel cast up even more mist that Hieronymous would hopefully think came from the warring elements, too.

The fireball had finally dissolved, and Wolfgang couldn't see farther than a foot.

He had to use the short time that was given to him, before Hieronymous would dissolve the mist in the area. With what little force was left in him he whammed his staff to the ground and conjured up a portal to behind where he remembered Hieronymous to have stood. In the same movement, he got out his secret weapon from his belt and hit it against his staff.

The portal activated and as soon as he landed he turned around in a smooth movement with his left arm outstretched. He had indeed landed with his back to Hieronymous's, and his weapon hit true to the man's temple. It was a tuning fork, and it resonated both with vibrations and his magic.

His intent was clear, and it rang throughout the other fae's body, commanding it to shut down into a deep sleep.

Hieronymous's body fell forwards and Wolfgang used his last inkling of power to make him fall soft and the mist to dissolve so that the audience could see that it was over.

He looked up towards the ranks, and suddenly sensations came back to him. The audience had been tuned out by him before, but now he could hear them cheer for his win, and it was deafening. What also came back was his pain – his shoulder felt weird, probably from where he had fallen to the ground, and all over his body he could feel blisters from the heat, the worst being on his hands. In his desperation, his eyes flurried over the first row of seats in search of either Nannerl or Antonio, but what they got hung up on instead was his father, leant back in his seat in contrast to everyone else standing, his face set into cold stone, and before he could take in any more, his vision grew black. A second later the noise was gone too. The last thing he felt before that sense, too, was gone, was strong arms catching him as he tumbled towards the ground.

~*~

The world was not any kinder to him upon waking. His senses returned in the order they had left, reversed – first was touch, the feel of the soft linens around him, the physical sensation of the sun touching his freckles, a hand holding his. Next, sound. His own breathing rasped strangely in his ears, he could hear the going-ons of the palace somewhere far away, and beside him he heard soft humming. Nannerl. Her lovely voice carried out a melody of her own making, which was as familiar to him as the back of his own hand. She used to sing it to him often, in the past. Whenever he couldn't fall asleep, or when he was mad at his father or the world unfair to them, or when he grew sick. It hadn't become any less comforting.

With the first blink of his eyes, he was also reminded of his physical ties to this realm. He didn't hurt per se, at least not as much as he faintly remembered to have done. His shoulder didn't feel like it had been screwed on wrongly to his body anymore, a big improvement, but it still felt rusty; and the skin where he knew it to have been blistered and burned before now felt strangely new and taut.

"Wolfie!" Nannerl exclaimed as he laid his eyes both on her metaphorical shining and the literal sun that back-lit her.

"Hey there, pumpkin," he drawled. "Have I been gone for long?"  
"Not at all. Your injuries weren't severe after all; Süßmayr says you were probably only out for so long because you were exhausted and needed a good, long sleep. It's been about a day since the duel."  
"Did I win?"  
"Did you _win_? Of course you did!"  
"But I fainted."

"And Hieronymous did, too. It was a duel till either death, surrender, or passing out, and he did so first. Therefore you're the winner. But no more about that – I'm glad you weren't seriously hurt, and I'm so _proud_ of you sweetie." She pressed a kiss to his hand and he did his best to squeeze hers back in gratitude.

"They probably think me weak though. I carried away so many injuries, and Hieronymous none."  
"Because you _held back from hurting him_. You even stopped him from hitting the floor forcefully when he blacked out. In my books, kindness should be praised above severity anyway. And you've always been so caring of people, even those who wish you bad."  
_I wish_, unspoken. As so many things he wanted to scream at the world.

"How late is it?" he asked instead, and took comfort in the small talk that evolved from there.

They were only at it for a good ten minutes before the door to the room opened and Antonio stepped in.

"I thought you might be awake," he explained himself. "The atmosphere in the palace suddenly felt brighter."  
He could hear Nannerl whisper out a short _sap_ beneath her breath as she stood up and had to hold back his giggling at that; she was right, after all, but he definitely would never complain about Antonio being sentimental and affectionate.

"I'll leave you two lovebirds alone then. Don't dislocate another joint of his."  
Wolfgang had to laugh in earnest at this, not because of what she said, but because of Antonio's nonplussed reaction to it. The door fell shut behind his sister and with it, the room grew into a sudden silence. The chair beside his bed scraped against the floor as Antonio pulled it back to sit in, and he took hold of Wolfgang's vacated hand.  
"How do you feel?"  
"I feel like I did when I got this sunburn at age seven; my skin feels as fake as the fabrics around me."

An all-too familiar furrow of concern grew between Antonio's eyes, and Wolfgang stepped in before he could go into full mother-hen mode.

"Other than that, fine. My body feels a bit tingly but that's probably from lying in bed for so long. Apart from that – what's the result of the duel? Nannerl says I've won."  
"Of course you have, nobody could have denied that after seeing Hieronymous fall first, and I am very proud of you, Wolfgang. You've shown true tactical talent and endurance. Besides – the majority of the audience had been in your favour anyway. Your travels have paid out well. So many of them had met you and deemed you lovely, and so many had heard of you and how you captured everyone's hearts, and they were there to cheer you on. If you hadn't won, they would've rioted. In fact … one of the palace elders, an old supporter of Hieronymous, raised the issue of not having seen what kind of magic you used to knock Hieronymous out. The public response was enormous. I don't think anyone still wishes anyone but you on the throne."

A weight lifted off his chest. "I'm glad," he murmured and let his head fall back into the pillows. His eyes closed on their own accord, and he must've dozen off for a while, but when he woke back up Antonio was still there, still holding onto his hand while reading through letters with his other.

The sight reminded him-

"Hey, Antonio."  
"Hm?"

"I wish to do more work. I mean – I get that you're king at the moment, but yesterday I realised how much the idleness has been gnawing at me, and I don't wish to keep going on like that. It can be anything really, I'll even trim the gardens or feed the horses. I guess if you don't trust me with that I could also lock myself away to compose, but it'd be a selfish occupation, seeing as the fae's culture doesn't seem to care much for instrumental music ..."  
"Wolfgang," Antonio interrupted his murmuring. "I'd gladly let you take on more kingly palace work. The Allmother knows it'd probably do us both good; I'd have more free time to spend with you, and you'd learn and keep idle hands busy. Aside from that, it would not be selfish of you at all to play more and – compose. I know your old life revolved around it, and it must be so strange for you to have so suddenly been ripped away from it, so please pick it up again as it pleases you. I, certainly, have never heard anything lovelier than your tunes."  
"Nannerl is right, you're such a sap," he answered with a mischievous smile, but his throat was strangely tight, and he could feel his eyes begin to water.

Antonio took no offense to it, instead, his answering smile was soft, and he leant forward to press a kiss to each of Wolfgang's cheeks. It was accompanied by magic, a spell to make him sleepy.

"Rest some more now, dear. Tomorrow you'll be on your legs again and we can tackle the world anew. Everything will be easier now."  
  


~*~

The new year also seemed to have brought a new light with it. The air in the capital was still cold, but it was the kind that refreshed your breath and spirit. Wolfgang hadn't been unpopular before, quite the opposite, but now he noticed that the people, his people, had begun regarding him as an actual king. Antonio had begun handing out royal tasks to him, although they didn't contain anything actually important, any big decision making. Of course they didn't, after all it was still the winter courts's turn of reign, and the seelie king having a leading hand in that would cause actual protests despite any recent developments. Him being popular wouldn't change it. It was because of that, that, over the next few weeks, Wolfgang didn't think anything bad whenever he came into a room and Antonio and his conversation partners abruptly stopped talking. They always looked so uncomfortable at the sight of him, but maybe it was only because they didn't know how to behave at the interruption. Maybe.

"Antonio," Wolfgang asked one night. "You'd tell me if there was anything important I should know, right?"  
"Of course." He didn't look up from his book.

"Especially after you kept the complaints from me last time."  
A non-committal hum.

The sound struck a bad chord with him, and as he turned around to pretend to go to sleep, a single tear escaped the corner of his eye.

~*~

He felt weird. The bad feeling just wouldn't leave him, and no manner of reassurances from Antonio would shake it. He was still kissing Wolfgang, still cuddling him at night, god knows nothing in their relationship had changed, but outside of their chambers he had grown strangely distant, _professional_. As if Wolfgang was just another political party, not his _partner_, his _sun_.

A lot of letters addressed to the current king flew into the palace each and every week. Wolfgang had had a great look at many of them, notes and reports from mayors, chiefs of guard, any kind of authority figure from all of the provinces he had seen on his trip over the lands. Antonio never hid them from him, most laid out on the secretary desk in their rooms, but recently some had picked up in frequency. They were all from the same sender.  
Wolfgang hadn't read a single one of them. He had never just opened a letter on his own, after all, but Antonio had never gone out of his way to read and keep them outside of their chambers, either. It could just be one of Antonio's relatives, he knew he had some somewhere out there. Maybe there was news in their family, something too personal that he wasn't ready to share yet, maybe Antonio was becoming an uncle or his mother was sick or anything.. Maybe family really was where he drew the line in sharing information with Wolfgang.

He couldn't help but snatch a letter, one day, when they lay on Antonio's desk, unopened. He felt kind of bad about it, but it wasn't to break Antonio's trust, not at all, no – after all, there was nothing to break when there was none existent. He felt nothing as he ripped open the dark envelope with a paper knife, feeling neither anticipation nor dread in the face of either affirmation or being wrong in his suspicions.

The letter was short, no salutations or signature. He began to read.

_The rot is progressing. _

_About two hectares of the forest are now affected, and the scope is growing daily._

_The spring fae set onto the case have found no remedy yet._

_Neither have we managed to reinforce the barrier, it seems to eat all of our magic up._

_It is growing weaker by the day, at this point it'll only be a matter of weeks before it breaks._

_My king, I really think you ought to look at it yourself._

That was where it stopped, and Wolfgang had to read over it a few times to make sense of it.

Then, finally, it clicked.

"Oh," he whispered. "_Oh no._"

His shaking hands let it drop back to the desk, but he paid them no mind. Neither did he register his legs moving on their own, away from their chambers, away from that cursed letter.

Something was wrong with the Night Forest. Something was wrong with a barrier, and they needed Antonio's help with it. The barrier that kept them safe from the Shadow Realm.

His breathing quickened.

He had only just entered this magical world, found a modicum of happiness outside of his sister and mother here and – and oh, no, his mother. They hadn't seen or tended to her grave in months. He hadn't even thought much about their world after the first month of having been here, and how could he, but he also couldn't help but _not_ grieve after it. He had left it behind. He had found this wonderful place, but he hadn't even been here for a year, and it was so strange to him still in every aspect but himself and Nannerl. And now it was being threatened, maybe destroyed, and him with it. Two roads opened up in his mind's eye, one leading back home, into a safe past and future, and one further down the path he was currently walking, the end obscured by uncertainty.

He was almost entirely sure which one he'd walk a thousand times, but what if this decision was _wrong_?  
"Wolfie!" he heard from behind him; - Nannerl, out of breath, she must've run after him. He was nearly at the outskirts of the capital. "Something felt wrong, so I came looking for you, and … what's the matter?"  
Her concern showed clearly on her face, and Wolfgang was hit with a sudden rush of gratitude. Overwhelmed by everything that had happened that day, hell, the past few weeks, he fell into her arms, a wrangled sob escaping him.

Nannerl, angel that she was, lead him towards a secluded side street so that they weren't so out in the open, and hugged him back fiercely.  
"Has he done you wrong? I am quite sure Constanze and I could make it look like an accident."  
His ugly crying was interrupted by an even uglier snort. "No – I mean … I don't know. I read one of his letters and I know I shouldn't have but … Our people, the fae, are in danger, Nannerl. We've only just begun to _live_, to live in this world, and now it's all in danger."  
"What do you want to do about it?"  
His breathing halted in shock.

"You're king, Wolfie, if you want to fight for this, you can and you will. If you want to leave all of this behind then .. then I will come with you. This realm is just as important to me as it is to you. But we ought to stick together."  
Another sob. "Nannerl, please don't _ever_ again put your own happiness and decisions behind mine. I – I want to stay too. I want to fight. But … I also want to go home. Just for a day or so, maybe a week, the letter says we have that much time at least, and it's not like I can help much with the current situation. I just want to see home again. I want to see mamá. I _need_ to feel glad about having left all that behind, that fighting for this isn't a wrong decision."

"Let us go, then. They can fare without us for so long. But – shouldn't we tell somebody?"  
Wiping his eyes with his sleeves, he smiled ruefully. "Part of me wants to tell nobody, just to make Antonio worry as payback for having been such an ass lately."  
"Let's do that, then. It's not for long after all and you're not the current regent, so they shouldn't miss you. Just – let's tell Constanze? And ask her to keep quiet."  
"Alright."  
They hugged once more and, worded into a quick message, sent Constanze a magical note in form of a paper butterfly.

~*~

The clearing didn't look much different from when they had last seen it, all those months ago when they had entered this realm through their father's portal. They still hadn't had any snowfall yet, so the red-tinted grass that had astonished Wolfgang so much back then was still visible. He knew now that the eerie silence that had filled this area wasn't usual for this realm – wildlife was more common and vocal elsewhere. He had wondered about it, mentioned it in passing, before he had become king and it was explained to him that animals kept away from it because it was so magically charged due to its closeness to their home realm. Now that he was more attuned to his own powers, he could feel it.

It was like the earth was alive, humming, beneath him, giving him strength.

"It's so strange to be back here," Nannerl spoke softly. She reached out for a branch of a nearby willow, and it reacted to her presence by reaching back in a motion of airiness.

"Can you feel it?" He put a hand to the floor. "It feels as if it remembers us. It's beckoning us back."  
"But it will let us back in once we want to return, right?"  
"The magic of these lands knows us now, it'd welcome us back."  
"Let's hope so."  
They sat down and waited for twilight to appear. Wolfgang was not so confident as to think that he could open a portal to another realm without its help, but when it came he didn't doubt that they'd succeed. As such he pressed his hand to the ground, the one on which he was still wearing Antonio's ring, and Nannerl channelled supporting magic into him by cradling his head with her hand, her magical instrument sitting snug under his chin.

Glowing surrounded them, and then they were gone.

~*~

Antonio wasn't sure how to break it to Wolfgang. It had been two weeks since the patrols in the Night Forest first noticed the anomalies in the Shadow Realm border and reported them to him. The barrier that separated their lands from those of the shadow court had been in existence for far longer than any currently living fae, and the fact that it was still functional in combination with the general population's averseness towards the Night Forest led to them not knowing much about it. It was working, after all, so why meddle with it?

It was foolish, in hindsight.

Even though he had grown up in close vicinity to it, Antonio had never once come even remotely close to it, despite what people liked to think and gossip about. It scared him when he was young.  
Only decades later, when he discovered that he was capable of strong shadow magic, did he connect the feel of it to that of the barrier.

It was logical for such a barrier to be made to absorb other magic, lest people could try to fight against it. His suspicion probably wasn't too far off; the barrier likely was pure shadow magic itself, and anyone who dared cross it lost any power they had upon crossing. If it even could be crossed. Which made him think – what if it could be? There had been reports before of unfortunate fae without any magical talent, so what if shadow fae who had crossed the border in self-sacrifice dwelled amongst those, spying on them and relaying information to their own home?

Had they ever been safe?  
Wolfgang and his sister hadn't been in this realm for long, especially in the eyes of century old beings, and he so wished this wasn't happening so soon after their arrival. His people had been living in peace for aeons, and now this was in danger. He would do anything in his might to avoid another war.

But for now he needed to figure out how to tell Wolfgang about it. He should have done it when the first letter arrived, coward that he was, yet his own uncertainty had kept him from it. He didn't like to admit that this was beyond him, that he currently had no idea what to do about this, that he couldn't protect Wolfgang from this. He'd destroy how the younger man looked up at him, despite being more talented, while he was at it. Part of him had hoped the problem would just … go away. That it was just a mood of nature, a short virus in the system that weakened it momentarily but only made it stronger afterwards. Yet two weeks had gone by and no change for the better was in sight. He loathed having to do this, but dragging it out longer would only make matters worse.

Their chambers were empty when he stepped in, despite it being a ways into the evening, but he thought nothing of it. It didn't happen seldom that Wolfgang spent away the hours of the day in company of his sister and Cäcilia's daughters, or burrowed deep into a book in one of the libraries to learn more about this realm. The thought of him made Antonio's heart blossom with warmth.

His Wolfgang was the rays of the daring sun that touched the earth, caressing every creature with his joyfulness and compassion, reaching into Antonio's chest to chase away any shadows and doubts with each smile and touch he granted him.  
He tried so hard to find a place for himself in their culture, and he was succeeding so marvellously. He was so proud of him. He loved him so much.

Figuring that he'd just wait until Wolfgang returned, Antonio turned towards their workplace area to pick out a book or see if any work had been added to his desk. That's when his eyes fell to the letter. One that he hadn't opened himself.

Dread creeping up on him, he took it in hand. Maybe he had only forgotten that he had opened it, maybe it was one that actually belonged to Wolfgang and not him, but – no.

Undeniably.

The contents of the message were just as smothering as the fact that Wolfgang had read it, had opened it before Antonio could explain the situation himself. And, oh no, he was probably so mad at him … for keeping another, such big thing from him after he had already done that before not so long ago and _promised_ not to keep anything from him anymore.

He had to find him.  
Or was it better to give him space?

Antonio didn't know what he should do, and that just wrecked him. He'd just – he'd just compromise between the two, wait until the time they usually went to bed, and if he hadn't returned by then, he should go look for him.  
Yes.  
That's what he'd do.

So he sat down on one of the armchairs, looking towards the door, and waited.

The seconds were marked with each pump of blood that coursed through his veins, and he felt properly drained by the time nearly two hours had gone by without any sight of his partner.

By then he was truly worried sick. Wolfgang not coming back to him must mean he was truly mad – quite the task, considering the fact that he was usually so forgiving no matter the offence. But where could he be? Not many places came to mind, thankfully, at first – Nannerl, the spring court princesses, Stephanie and Lorenzo … actually, now that he thought of it, Wolfgang had made so many friends in his short stay here, nevermind that he had learned how to teleport. His thought process made him just the more distressed, but – he'd have to keep a cool head. Never mind all the possibilities, he'd still tell Nannerl where he was going, no matter what.  
So that's where he went.

No one answered her door when he knocked multiple times; so, in his impatience, he sent his magic through it to detect if there was anyone in the room that just chose to ignore him. Her chambers where indeed empty, so he moved on to the next person on his list.

The spring court wing of the palace was bright even in the late night-hours, his steps loud in the expanse of the corridors that were empty safe for a few guards. They sent a few curious glances towards him, but no one interrupted his stride.

He knocked again, once, twice, and to his relief a sleepy looking Constanze, dressed in a night dress and robe and with her hair let down, answered to door eventually.

"King Antonio," she blinked at him in surprise, her slack posture immediately straightening up and face setting into emotionless stone. "What-"  
"Where is he. I mean-" He couldn't keep his hand from driving through his dishevelled hair. "Do you know where he is? Mozart, I mean?"  
She stared at him firmly for a few seconds before he facade turned to concern and she stepped slightly to the side to make way. "Come inside. I was asked to keep quiet but you look so frantic you've got me worried too."  
He stepped through, relieved at the thought that maybe he was about to see Wolfgang; but no, no one but them was in the room. Constanze closed the door again and leant against it once turned around towards him again.

"I haven't seen them after we had dinner together, but they sent me a note. They said that you had messed up, and that they wanted to spend a bit of time in their home realm before coming back again."  
His blood froze cold. "What."  
"They're visiting their home, only for a few days."  
He felt as if he couldn't breathe, yet he could clearly felt his chest heave quick-patterned, like a hummingbirds wing, and his panic wouldn't rest until Wolfgang was back in his arms. "They … _they can't do that_."  
Where before, Constanze was concerned yet apprehensive and respectful, she now frowned at him in obvious indignation. "Why not, you aren't their keeper. I know you're king, but you can't order them around."  
"No, you don't understand … and I can't go after him because ..." He felt faint, both in body and in heart, his legs leading him back stumblingly to where he could sit down on her bed. Constanze, who had only ever seen him stoic and composed, took a step forward, hand lifted.  
"Are you alright? Are _they_ alright? Please, tell me what I don't understand!"

"We don't know where they are. There's a whole other world out there, and we don't know where they are. I've lost him, I can't go after him. I have to – the barrier – but _he_ -" He was rambling, he knew, but he felt so dizzy he somehow had to stay anchored to the world around him.

"What do you mean, Antonio? They said they'll come back after a few days or so-"  
"No!" Antonio interrupted her, his frantic eyes shooting up. "They don't have any magic over there, they can't come back on their own!"

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed it! 
> 
> Kudos and Comments are as always much appreciated~
> 
> Come chat with me on Tumblr @Hakuryen


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